[Deck] Nic Fit (GBx Explorer Zenith Control)

[Stoyrm]

Punishing NicFit

Creatures: 13
1 Birds of Paradise
2 Scavenging Ooze
1 Thrun, the Last Troll
1 Huntmaster of the Fells
2 Eternal Witness
3 Veteran Explorer
1 Grave Titan
1 Wickerbough Elder
1 Broodmate Dragon

Spells: 26
2 Liliana of the Veil
2 Sensei's Divining Top
2 Garruk Relentless
4 Green Sun's Zenith
4 Cabal Therapy
3 Pernicious Deed
4 Punishing Fire
3 Maelstrom Pulse
1 Skeletal Scrying
2 Thoughtseize

Lands: 22
1 Dryad Arbor
3 Swamp
4 Grove of the Burnwillows
2 Bayou
2 Taiga
4 Verdant Catacombs
2 Wooded Foothills
3 Forest
1 Mountain

After a bit of testing i've decided to go with the 3 Explorer, 1 Birds. Reasoning being that drawing the 2nd Explorer is pretty bad. Also, having Gaddock Teeg in the board, i can actually cast it with Birds should i draw it. I'm not quite sure on the build quite yet, but it seems like an okay starting point atm. Fighting off Jaces and small critters should be a lot easier, in theory atleast.

EDIT: Trying out a second Garruk Relentless instead of a Master of the Wild Hunt as well. Reasoning; It dies to more removal than Garruk does.

[Alexeezay]

Nice list! I will try it out next week, adding a Garruk instead of Master of the Wildhunt

[Atlanos]

Maybe -2 Misty + 2 Foothills to fetch for Mountain ;).

[Chikenbok]

From my last list I added 1 treetop village and cut -1 Sun Titan +1 Primevil Titan. Will post results after some testing.

[Philipp2293]

Today was my first real life tournament with Huntmaster of the Fells (replacing the last Kitchen Finks in my MD). Card was great all day, you gain so much more value out if it compared to Kitchen Finks. I recommend everyone playing Jund colored lists to at least consider him.

[igri_is_a_bk]

How come this deck doesn't use four SDT? I always want one in my opener. They are never bad in multiples, and make a lot of sense with people using random shit like a single Recurring Nightmare or Planeswalker X in their lists.

[Philipp2293]

I agree that the deck needs some healthy amount of tops, currently I'm running 3. Maybe 4 is the right call, but atm my deck is pretty tight between removal, some disruption, the basics and the toolbox, so I dunno really what to cut.

Another point I'd like to raise for Jund colored Nic Fit: Has anybody ever considered running a singleton Gaddock Teeg in the SB? Sure it sucks to draw him naturally, but usually combo players do not expect hatebears from Jund and won't side accordingly.

If you're in a small meta and your opponents start to know the trick you can also start mindfucking them ala "Have I brought my Teeg this time or not?" Maybe this is BS, maybe its worth a try.

[dalai lamer]

So basically me and a friend of mine are reading this thread for a very long time now, and we playtested a nic fit version which is kind of different than those common ones you guys are talking about:

// Lands
    3 [ZEN] Verdant Catacombs
    1 [FUT] Dryad Arbor
    2 [B] Bayou
    2 [US] Phyrexian Tower
    1 [B] Underground Sea
    2 [B] Tropical Island
    3 [ZEN] Forest (1a)
    2 [ZEN] Swamp (1a)
    2 [ZEN] Island (1)
    3 [ZEN] Misty Rainforest

// Creatures
    1 [CMD] Scavenging Ooze
    4 [CMD] Veteran Explorer
    1 [M12] Grave Titan
    1 [EVE] Wickerbough Elder
    1 [SHM] Kitchen Finks
    1 [MBS] Thrun, the Last Troll
    2 [FD] Eternal Witness
    1 [M10] Master of the Wild Hunt

// Spells
    1 [EX] Recurring Nightmare
    1 [B] Regrowth
    2 [ARB] Maelstrom Pulse
    2 [WWK] Jace, the Mind Sculptor
    2 [OD] Innocent Blood
    2 [CHK] Gifts Ungiven
    4 [IA] Brainstorm
    4 [JU] Cabal Therapy
    4 [MBS] Green Sun's Zenith
    3 [AP] Pernicious Deed
    1 [M12] Garruk, Primal Hunter
    1 [INN] Garruk Relentless

As you can see, our list takes the advantages of the blue splash in terms of card draw (brainstorm), which leads us to a more control based version with jace. In my opinion, gifts ungiven is a very usefull add for this deck creating neckbreaking piles, wherefore a singleton regrowth is added.

Compared to other lists, I guess we are missing a little bit of pressure but im not sure about it.

Any help/ideas/thoughts?

[Stoyrm]

I agree that the deck needs some healthy amount of tops, currently I'm running 3. Maybe 4 is the right call, but atm my deck is pretty tight between removal, some disruption, the basics and the toolbox, so I dunno really what to cut.

Another point I'd like to raise for Jund colored Nic Fit: Has anybody ever considered running a singleton Gaddock Teeg in the SB? Sure it sucks to draw him naturally, but usually combo players do not expect hatebears from Jund and won't side accordingly.

If you're in a small meta and your opponents start to know the trick you can also start mindfucking them ala "Have I brought my Teeg this time or not?" Maybe this is BS, maybe its worth a try.

I like having it in the SB. I can also play it with the singleton Birds of Paradise should the Teeg end up in my hand. As for the number of tops, i never want to see multiples, but i do like having access to 1. So far, 2 has been fine, but 3 might be correct.

[waSP]

re: dalai lamer
For builds not running Hymn, having double black is not that important. To amp up the pressure a bit, you could cut a Swamp and your Underground Sea for Creeping Tar Pits and run Primeval Titan over Grave Titan.


At this point can we all agree that Birds of Paradise is superior to Dryad Arbor in every case except the 'SURPRISE!' blocker for Goblin Lackey and when you are topdecking with a full 'yard and Recurring Nightmare in hand/play? BoP draws removal much better than Arbor (for all you Ooze-lovers) and adds welcome flexibility when searching out lands.

Gifts Ungiven is extremely powerful in this deck in its ability to find Cabal Therapy (as well as bomb-y things/removal). I don't think making great Gifts piles has been discussed much on this thread yet because so few players are running blue builds.

[Arianrhod]

I think I can agree with that, although I cut it for a 4th Forest instead of for a Bird. Bird is a good idea, although I'm in much the same boat as everyone else at this point regarding cuts. I wouldn't cut an Explorer for a Bird, because lategame the Explorer can still punch somebody for one, where the Bird is completely blank.

I've been out of the Gifts loop for a while, but one of my favorite stacks was always {Sun Titan - Recurring Nightmare - Eternal Witness - [Situational]}. {Academy Rector - Cabal Therapy - Sun Titan - Pernicious Deed} is a good one, too. It either sweeps or sets up game-ending board state, depending on what you need it to do. Also people are really, really stupid with Rector in Gifts piles. It was one of the cards I always got whenever I put it in a pile.

[igri_is_a_bk]

Life from the Loam
Academy Ruins
Engineered Explosives
Volrath's Stronghold
Eternal Witness
Worm Harvest
Raven's Crime
Cabal Therapy

These are the cards I've seen most often in piles.

Here's a question, is the extra card worth the extra mana that Gifts costs compared to Intuition?

[Anusien]

One of the problems with Gifts/Intuition is after you've already spent an entire turn in the early game to cast the spell, most of the piles take an extra turn or two to do anything cool. There are probably decks where you can not do anything for four turns and still win, but I don't know what they are.

[dalai lamer]

One of the problems with Gifts/Intuition is after you've already spent an entire turn in the early game to cast the spell, most of the piles take an extra turn or two to do anything cool. There are probably decks where you can not do anything for four turns and still win, but I don't know what they are.

True, but i guess its most of the time really powerful and if doing right it can change the board as allready mentioned. Furthermore i guess that you should not play gifts straight away in turn 3-4 when you are able to create some bord presence with GSZ instead.

Adding manlands and primeval titan sounds pretty good atm.

RE Intuition: Due to veteran explorer we have always enough mana to play gifts ungiven which is, as far as I see it, simply superior than intuition in this deck.

[Anusien]

If they open on turn 1 Delver turn 2 other guy, Gifts on turn 4 is going to be too slow. Gifts on turn 7 is much slower.

[waSP]

Most of the deck is too slow for Turn 1 Delver, Turn 2 other guy. Unless you're running spot removal in the Gifts slot (you may be!), its replacement isn't likely to do a whole lot better. Gifts is how you take control of a game that has stalled. And stalling is what the rest of the deck is for.

[Anusien]

If you just need some game-dominating board on turn 6, pretty much any card will do.

[Koplinchen]

Does anyone know more about that Nic "Scapeshift" Fit deck? I would love to see decklist.

[Koby]

Does anyone know more about that Nic "Scapeshift" Fit deck? I would love to see decklist.

If my memory serves me well...

4 Burning Wish
3 Scapeshift
4 Veteran Explorer
4 Cabal Therapy
X Viridian Emissary
X Green Sun's Zenith

2 Valakut
X -duals
X Mountain
X Forest
X Swamp

SB:
1 Scapeshift

I didn't pay attention to much of the match, since it was well in the Scapeshift player's control against RUG Tempo. I imagine a Primeval Titan wouldn't be out of reach for this deck.

[lunabass]

ok so this may be a stupid idea, but how about 4 enlightened tutors in the main? and cutting deed to 1 or 2, cutting 1-2 tops, etc, so that the deck has a green zenith toolbox and a enlightened tutor toolbox?

getting recurring nightmare would be alot easier, and in time a need a well placed deed wil fix the board possition for you, also, sideboarding against combo or dredge would be alot easier, this way you could clear up alot of slots in the sb, and in the deck

you could also afford to play alot more artifacts/enchantments to help you win the game

on the red version: what about burning wish, cut zenith to 3 and 1 in the SB... sounds nice to have acces to 7 zeniths no?
also, you could then create a wishboard against the harder matchups, cabal therapy can be cut to 3 as well, and 1 in the wishboard etc... this deck doesnt have any problem with that kind of mana intensive stuff, and after a explorer, you wouldn't feel the burning wish that much at all

sounds better then living wish anyway :D since your not really giving zenith up

what about summoners pact to get explorer btw? (i'm kinda brainstorming here there isnt much thought put up) the turn after explorer you could always cabal him or use phyrexian tower, of course you would end up losing a turn.

on second thought the pact is a terrible idea